Nutter Butter and Chocolate Covered Banana Pudding

It's time to go over the river and through the woods again to have dinner with our daughter-in-law and 4 grandkids in their log cabin in the woods. This week I'm bringing Crescent-topped Casserole and for dessert I bringing this yummy, gooey, delish dessert. This morning as I was deciding what to take for dessert I looked through my pantry and I spied a package of Nutter Butter peanut butter sandwich cookies left over from some Christmas projects I did with the grandkids. That got my wheels turning, so I looked around and found a couple of other tasty ingredients and before you know it I had put together a whole new dessert.

This is how I started...

I gathered these ingredients: Nutter Butter cookies, two packages of Jello instant banana pudding mix, 5 bananas, lemon juice, butter, and Cool Whip.

At this point I was debating about doing a layered dessert in individual cups with lids, but I thought better of it. I decided to use a glass 9x13 pan so I would have only one dish to carry. I think this recipe would look nice in a stemmed glass or a trifle bowl, but today I used a glass pan.

I put the whole package of cookies in my food processor and pulsed until they were fine crumbs. Then I melted 6 tablespoons of butter in the microwave and poured it into the processor and mixed it thoroughly into the cookie crumbs.

Next I sliced the bananas and sprinkled them with lemon juice. I used about 2 tablespoons of juice for 5 bananas. I stirred the sliced bananas gently in the lemon juice to make sure all surfaces were covered.

I put aside about 2 tablespoons of the cookie crumbs to use as a decoration on the top and then I put 1/2 of the remaining cookie crumbs into the bottom of the glass pan. Then I spooned 1/2 of the bananas on top of the crumbs. I tried to make sure I didn't get any of the lemon juice on there ~ I tried to leave as much lemon juice as I could in the bowl since I didn't want the lemon flavor, just the citric acid to prevent the bananas from browning.

This is where I decided to add something else...I had a jar of Saunder's Hot Fudge sauce in my refrigerator, so I decided to microwave it and pour it over the bananas.

I had about 3/4 of a jar in my fridge and I used 1/2 of it for this layer. (If I had a full jar I would have used 1/2 of the full jar for this layer.)

Next, I made the instant banana pudding according to the package directions for pie ~ using 3 cups of cold milk for two boxes of mix. Then I poured 1/2 of the pudding mix on top.

I repeated the layers with the remaining cookie crumbs (except for the ones I set aside for the top), the bananas, the chocolate fudge and the banana pudding. Then I spread the Cool Whip over the top making sure it touched all the edges to seal. (I used Cool Whip Lite...that makes this good for you, right?) And then I sprinkled on the reserved cookie crumbs, and refrigerated this until it was time for me to take this to my taste testers (about 4 hours).

Here is the recipe for Chocolate Covered Banana and Nutter Butter Pudding

1 package Nutter Butter Sandwich Cookies
6 tablespoons butter, melted
5 bananas, peeled and sliced
2 Tablespoons lemon juice
1 jar Hot Fudge ice cream topping (I like Saunder's best)
2 packages Jello instant banana pudding
3 cups cold milk
8 oz Cool Whip

Pulse cookies in a food processor until fine crumbs. Add melted butter and pulse until thoroughly combined.
Take 2 tablespoons of the cookie crumb mixture out and set aside.
In a 9x13 glass container, spread 1/2 of remaining cookie crumb mixture.
In a separate bowl, put sliced bananas and lemon juice. Stir gently to cover bananas with juice. Pour off and throw away as much juice as possible. Spoon 1/2 of the juice covered banana slices on top of the cookie crumbs.
Warm hot fudge sauce in the microwave and then pour 1/2 of it over the bananas.
In a large bowl, mix the pudding mix and the milk with a whisk for about 2 minutes, or until fully dissolved.
Pour 1/2 of the pudding mixture over the chocolate covered bananas.
Repeat the layers with remaining cookie crumbs (except for the ones held out for decoration), bananas, hot fudge sauce and pudding.
Cover the top with Cool Whip.
Sprinkle with reserved cookie crumbs.
Refrigerate for at least 4 hours.

This is a perfect bite of creamy, crunchy, ooey, gooey, scrumptious goodness!

What was the taste tester's bottom line?

My taste testers were very happy with this dessert. The Nutter Butter cookies did not give it as much of a peanut butter taste as I expected, but the flavor  and texture of the cookie crumbs was good. This dessert-with-a-long-name got a thumbs-up from everyone for taste. Some even asked for seconds. It is rich, so having a cup of coffee with it is probably a good idea.

The bottom line: I would make this again ~ but I may have to come up with another name for it. What do you think would be a good name?